Because you're speaking to everyone. Not just the person you quoted. If you wanna be speaking to just the person you quoted, there is a messaging feature on here.
What are you doing? You can't just quote me when you are talking to me. Why aren't you making a private message instead like it supposed to? Forums are not made for this! You are such a rebel... 
"You are not coherent" is indeed a personal insult.
If you are overly sensitive and take everything personally. I didn't use swear words, nor did I call you names or anything.
But since you seem to need clarity and closure, I'll elaborate. I'll even use small words.
The status of a single species, or even two or three, is
miniscule insignificantsmall compared to the sheermagnitudeenormityscale of all themyriadlots and lots of stars and planets in this very galaxy that would end up ignored for no reason.
Talking about personal insults...
And it's still not relevant. Me and themikefest were talking about the Stargazer and what his words could imply. I made a point that most of the big decisions can hardly be considered a mere "detail" in-universe.
And then you busted in with your out of universe hating on the Ark Theory again. Which wasn't a question at that point.
Hence you were off-topic in the context of my converstaion with themikefest. Calling you out on that doesn't make it a personal insult.
I'd like to think the fate of the galaxy and many of its major civilisations are choices that are worthy of being left intact for the next game, but that's just me. Given that, y'know, ME3 was entirely about deciding the fate of the galaxy.
An 'intact choice' doesn't mean anything to me if it at the same time also means the abandoning of an entire setting.
I don't care if the next ME game(s) will play before, during or after the Shepard trilogy, if in the Milky way or not, or if we'll see familiar faces again.
But I absolutely hate the thought of never having a ME set in the milky way again. The only way (I can see right now) to circumvent this, is to lessen the effect of the trilogy/ME3 choices.
And this is exactly what Bioware has been doing over the entire trilogy anyway! Rather successfully at that I might add.
"Rather successfully"? That practice is one of the primary flaws of the trilogy imoAn 'intact choice' doesn't mean anything to me if it at the same time also means the abandoning of an entire setting.
I don't care if the next ME game(s) will play before, during or after the Shepard trilogy, if in the Milky way or not, or if we'll see familiar faces again.
But I absolutely hate the thought of never having a ME set in the milky way again. The only way (I can see right now) to circumvent this, is to lessen the effect of the trilogy/ME3 choices.
And this is exactly what Bioware has been doing over the entire trilogy anyway! Rather successfully at that I might add.
"Rather successfully"? That practice is one of the primary flaws of the trilogy imo
It is kind of both, isn't it?!
Of course there is so much much more that could have done with all these choices, and is is kind of lame to see the minimalistic differences between them in later games.
But we still are all here and I bet most of us still debate internally whether we should let the council die or save the Collector base in every playthrough.
(Debate might not be the right word)
I just like the feeling of having a (at least somewhat) consistent universe. So in the end it is still a success in my book.
You ever notice how in the first game, it's all neat and cool learning about this stuff. You had the galaxy map to figure out, you had the comm room, you had the mini-map (or radar (or ladar I think they called it)). Then by the end of the game (in three) it's all referred to as "tech"? Yah, I mean, there's prolly a reason for that. Number one, writers are not scientists or engineers. They can be futurists. But without an understanding of either science or engineering, they're stumbling around in the dark. And I mean like at least a bachelors degree or equivalent.
I think to be brutally honest this was a result of a couple of writers leaving between ME and ME3. They seemed to have a systematic approach to developing the lore and the technology that might've been lost or diminished in later games.
Chris L'Etoile (who wrote Noveria and other stuff in ME1 and who also wrote Legion in ME2) was very interested in getting the science-y technobabble to sound right, and to make sure that whatever they were talking about was at the very least grounded in something semi-realistic.
He also said on his blog once that when the writers were creating the ME universe, he and Drew Karpyshyn used to have debates about the backstory and issues like whether all of the current Earth nations would still exist. That's also what the Dragon Age team did, to the point that they have a whole internal wiki full of stuff and have been able to publish two encyclopaedias of basically lore and timelines. There's a bunch of stuff in there that has never been in the games and probably never will be, but it's there for the writers so they know more about their own universe.
I'm not saying the ME writers are necessarily making stuff up on the spot, but the lore of the setting and the universe seems pretty underdeveloped compared to DA, and it sounds like after ME1 they've just changed or adapted stuff as they needed to. (Or, because it sounds cool.)
For instance, the way mass relays and FTL work was given a pretty convincing explanation in ME1, given what we know about the 'mass effect' and its fake physics. Could anyone ever do the same thing for the Crucible, and would the writers even want to try? They just threw in a line about ancient technology and the Citadel and hoped the player would accept it.
So it's better to break the lore than to break the canon?
That's a false dichotomy; they can write a way for the ark to get to Andromeda without breaking the lore that's already been established. Something something secret experiments on Reaper engines BOOM ----> ark ship.
Once they set a canon, though, there's no going back - especially when it's something as big as ignoring the player's choices at the end of ME3.
(And really, breaking ~the lore~ is the lesser of two evils here - do you really think people will care more about FTL drives doing impossible things than "Bioware literally chose to ignore all our decisions in ME3 and canonise the state of the galaxy"?)
I don't quite follow the logic of this position. Each of your Shepards makes his or her decisions, which play out in various ways. If the sequel follows what happens in a universe where a different Shepard made a particular set of choices, how does that invalidate the other Shepards' choices any more than they invalidate each other?
It's the elevation of one set of choices over the others that is the issue. Bioware have always maintained that there's no canon in the story beyond what the player themselves decides. This is almost the selling point of their games, their area of uniqueness compared to other studios, and something that almost nobody else does. Abandoning it would be pretty disappointing.
I'm not opposed to "what if?" stories in principle (Dragon Age does it quite well for setting a world state in their comics and books) but it should not be used as the foundation for a future full game, let alone a series of games. It's a path that other companies use too often (Deus Ex) and Bioware have always held themselves to a higher standard before.
An 'intact choice' doesn't mean anything to me if it at the same time also means the abandoning of an entire setting.
I don't care if the next ME game(s) will play before, during or after the Shepard trilogy, if in the Milky way or not, or if we'll see familiar faces again.
But I absolutely hate the thought of never having a ME set in the milky way again. The only way (I can see right now) to circumvent this, is to lessen the effect of the trilogy/ME3 choices.
And this is exactly what Bioware has been doing over the entire trilogy anyway! Rather successfully at that I might add.
Right, and I think that is the central question of this whole issue - whether players' attachment to the Milky Way has a higher value than respecting the decisions of the player. It's ultimately something that's quite subjective.
My suggestion is that respecting the choices of the player should have a higher value, because I see narrative consistency and player choices as being more central to what makes a "Mass Effect" game than even the entire Milky Way, and I don't think nostalgia for the setting or characters is worth sacrificing that. I'd be completely happy with a new galaxy for the next game, and I'd be just as unhappy if instead they decided to retcon an ending or pretend two of them never happened.
I also expect that for Bioware, it's relatively easy to move to a new setting, and harder to let go of that idea that canon should be decided by the player. After all, they've just spent three games exploring most of the iconic locations of the Milky Way, we "said goodbye" to Shepard and all their crewmembers in ME3, the EC and the Citadel DLC, and - perhaps most importantly - Montreal has new writers who may want to take the franchise in new directions now that they have influence on the story.
If we look at the stuff they've been saying about NME - new, but with some familiar elements - I feel like they understand that dichotomy but have decided that they can take a chance on a new location as long as there are lots of reminders of the old one. Mac and Mike Gamble seemed to imply, for instance, that they designed the concept art of that huge indoor space station-y thing to look like the Citadel, because they recognised that it was by now an iconic part of the ME series. What we'll come to see as they reveal it is whether this approach will be enough to appease people who just want to play ME4 with all the characters they know and go back to all the same places.
Right, and I think that is the central question of this whole issue - whether players' attachment to the Milky Way has a higher value than respecting the decisions of the player. It's ultimately something that's quite subjective.
My suggestion is that respecting the choices of the player should have a higher value, because I see narrative consistency and player choices as being more central to what makes a "Mass Effect" game than even the entire Milky Way, and I don't think nostalgia for the setting or characters is worth sacrificing that. I'd be completely happy with a new galaxy for the next game, and I'd be just as unhappy if instead they decided to retcon an ending or pretend two of them never happened.
I also expect that for Bioware, it's relatively easy to move to a new setting, and harder to let go of that idea that canon should be decided by the player. After all, they've just spent three games exploring most of the iconic locations of the Milky Way, we "said goodbye" to Shepard and all their crewmembers in ME3, the EC and the Citadel DLC, and - perhaps most importantly - Montreal has new writers who may want to take the franchise in new directions now that they have influence on the story.
If we look at the stuff they've been saying about NME - new, but with some familiar elements - I feel like they understand that dichotomy but have decided that they can take a chance on a new location as long as there are lots of reminders of the old one. Mac and Mike Gamble seemed to imply, for instance, that they designed the concept art of that huge indoor space station-y thing to look like the Citadel, because they recognised that it was by now an iconic part of the ME series. What we'll come to see as they reveal it is whether this approach will be enough to appease people who just want to play ME4 with all the characters they know and go back to all the same places.
Here's my "player choice"... #SAVETHEMILKYWAY
That's a false dichotomy; they can write a way for the ark to get to Andromeda without breaking the lore that's already been established. Something something secret experiments on Reaper engines BOOM ----> ark ship.
I'd call that "space magic" more than lore. Though yes Mass Effect has been guilty of multiple counts of that over the years. I find it detracts from the setting rather than adding to it though
Once they set a canon, though, there's no going back - especially when it's something as big as ignoring the player's choices at the end of ME3.
(And really, breaking ~the lore~ is the lesser of two evils here - do you really think people will care more about FTL drives doing impossible things than "Bioware literally chose to ignore all our decisions in ME3 and canonise the state of the galaxy"?)
There are any number if instances where player choice was trivialized if not outright ignored in the series.
but yes, I do consider breaking the lore the lesser of two evils. And I mean that literally. I don't care much for either choice. But in the end, I'd rather keep a recognizable setting. Otherwise, this might as well be the third IP. Perhaps a "spiritual successor" to Mass Effect would be more accurate than "MENext".
I'd call that "space magic" more than lore. Though yes Mass Effect has been guilty of multiple counts of that over the years. I find it detracts from the setting rather than adding to it though
There are any number if instances where player choice was trivialized if not outright ignored in the series.
but yes, I do consider breaking the lore the lesser of two evils. And I mean that literally. I don't care much for either choice. But in the end, I'd rather keep a recognizable setting. Otherwise, this might as well be the third IP. Perhaps a "spiritual successor" to Mass Effect would be more accurate than "MENext".
If you are overly sensitive and take everything personally. I didn't use swear words, nor did I call you names or anything.
"Elevation" meaning that those choices are more real, or just more relevant?It's the elevation of one set of choices over the others that is the issue. Bioware have always maintained that there's no canon in the story beyond what the player themselves decides. This is almost the selling point of their games, their area of uniqueness compared to other studios, and something that almost nobody else does. Abandoning it would be pretty disappointing.
I've never seen that as being a higher standard. The obvious tradeoff is that if all choices can carry over, then none of them can be important. As far as I'm concerned a PC's choices should be retired with that PC. Back in the day I argued that DA2 shouldn't have a save import for exactly this reason.I'm not opposed to "what if?" stories in principle (Dragon Age does it quite well for setting a world state in their comics and books) but it should not be used as the foundation for a future full game, let alone a series of games. It's a path that other companies use too often (Deus Ex) and Bioware have always held themselves to a higher standard before.
Chris L'Etoile (who wrote Noveria and other stuff in ME1 and who also wrote Legion in ME2) was very interested in getting the science-y technobabble to sound right, and to make sure that whatever they were talking about was at the very least grounded in something semi-realistic.
I miss him 
I've never seen that as being a higher standard. The obvious tradeoff is that if all choices can carry over, then none of them can be important. As far as I'm concerned a PC's choices should be retired with that PC. Back in the day I argued that DA2 shouldn't have a save import for exactly this reason.
^This. What's the point in having choice carry over if all potential outcomes need to be watered down to accommodate the other choices. Maybe the choices themselves need to be structured differently so that you do not have one choice that would logically lead to a drastically different outcome than another, lower the stakes basically.
^This. What's the point in having choice carry over if all potential outcomes need to be watered down to accommodate the other choices. Maybe the choices themselves need to be structured differently so that you do not have one choice that would logically lead to a drastically different outcome than another, lower the stakes basically.
The choices should matter in the game where the choice takes place. Not in future games.
I wouldn't call the extinction of entire races a detail...
That one they could quite easily sidestep, as you don't really see it play out on screen. Also it was one of the sillier aspects of Mass Effect 3. Sabotaging the genophage or the Quarians losing at Rannoch shouldn't cause either to immediately go extinct.
If there was ever a post-ME3 sequel in the Milky Way the way to go about it would be have the Quarians survive a defeat at Rannoch, but in reduced numbers, and still without a home world. In a post-Reaper War setting they'd still be aboard the Migrant Fleet if you chose the Geth. Have choosing the Quarians result in the Quarians fully settling Rannoch and their former colony worlds, with the Migrant Fleet disappearing.
A similar thing could be done with the Krogan. Curing the genophage results in the Krogan resettling some of their former colony worlds, a resurgent Krogan fleet, and a Krogan ambassador aboard the Citadel. Sabotaging the cure results in the Krogan still being stuck on Tuchanka and with the DMZ still in place.
As for the Geth, dialogue by the Catalyst would give the devs an easy out. The Catalyst mentions that in the Extended Cut that anything destroyed by the Crucible can be rebuilt, and he says specifically in response to a query about the weapons' effects on Synthetics. If the Quarians were chosen at Rannoch they could have a rogue Quarian faction rebuild the Geth in the war's aftermath. The rebuilt Geth however are isolationist, hiding in the Perseus Veil, and do no trust organics beyond their own creators. If peace was achieved but the Geth were lost in Destroy, the new Quarian government of Rannoch rebuilds the Geth rather than a faction that went rogue. The rebuilt Geth live in harmony with their creators on Rannoch in a relationship similar to the Drell with the Hanar, but are almost never seen outside of Quarian space. If Synthesis/Control and peace was achieved at Rannoch, the Geth and Quarians share Rannoch as equals with a single ambassador representing both factions interests on the Citadel. The Geth have more involvement outside Quarian space.
All of the above could be conveyed quite easily by dialogue and codex entries alone, and potential issues such as the variable states of Rannoch and the Migrant Fleet can be avoided by not having either a location that you'll visit. The galaxy is a big place, and the series should seek to avoid continually revisiting the same locations repeatedly (outside the Citadel) anyway.
Quarian exosuits can be handled either by having the Quarians in all outcomes keeping their familiar exosuits, with them having become a part of Quarian culture even if Rannoch is settled, or by having the Quarians going unmasked in all outcomes. With the latter the Quarians would need to master some means of bolstering their immune systems in the lab if they are still aboard the Migrant Fleet.
That one they could quite easily sidestep, as you don't really see it play out on screen. Also it was one of the sillier aspects of Mass Effect 3. Sabotaging the genophage or the Quarians losing at Rannoch shouldn't cause either to immediately go extinct.
If there was ever a post-ME3 sequel in the Milky Way the way to go about it would be have the Quarians survive a defeat at Rannoch, but in reduced numbers, and still without a home world. In a post-Reaper War setting they'd still be aboard the Migrant Fleet if you chose the Geth. Have choosing the Quarians result in the Quarians fully settling Rannoch and their former colony worlds, with the Migrant Fleet disappearing.
A similar thing could be done with the Krogan. Curing the genophage results in the Krogan resettling some of their former colony worlds, a resurgent Krogan fleet, and a Krogan ambassador aboard the Citadel. Sabotaging the cure results in the Krogan still being stuck on Tuchanka and with the DMZ still in place.
As for the Geth, dialogue by the Catalyst would give the devs an easy out. The Catalyst mentions that in the Extended Cut that anything destroyed by the Crucible can be rebuilt, and he says specifically in response to a query about the weapons' effects on Synthetics. If the Quarians were chosen at Rannoch they could have a rogue Quarian faction rebuild the Geth in the war's aftermath. The rebuilt Geth however are isolationist, hiding in the Perseus Veil, and do no trust organics beyond their own creators. If peace was achieved but the Geth were lost in Destroy, the new Quarian government of Rannoch rebuilds the Geth rather than a faction that went rogue. The rebuilt Geth live in harmony with their creators on Rannoch in a relationship similar to the Drell with the Hanar, but are almost never seen outside of Quarian space. If Synthesis/Control and peace was achieved at Rannoch, the Geth and Quarians share Rannoch as equals with a single ambassador representing both factions interests on the Citadel. The Geth have more involvement outside Quarian space.
All of the above could be conveyed quite easily by dialogue and codex entries alone, and potential issues such as the variable states of Rannoch and the Migrant Fleet can be avoided by not having either a location that you'll visit. The galaxy is a big place, and the series should seek to avoid continually revisiting the same locations repeatedly (outside the Citadel) anyway.
Quarian exosuits can be handled either by having the Quarians in all outcomes keeping their familiar exosuits, with them having become a part of Quarian culture even if Rannoch is settled, or by having the Quarians going unmasked in all outcomes. With the latter the Quarians would need to master some means of bolstering their immune systems in the lab if they are still aboard the Migrant Fleet.
Heck given how aptly they ignored sidestepped Anderson being Councilor, the rachni situation, and heck whether you kept or destroyed the Colelctor Base, they can do anything.
Having player decisions affect the survival of entire species is a bad idea anyway in any series where there is potential for a sequel. If the results are carried through into the sequel you've now got a smaller and less interesting setting, since the determinant status means those species will no longer play a major role even if they survived. The best way for Bioware to go about it with a sequel would be to have player choices in ME3's end game affect those species, without removing them entirely from the setting.
Hopefully in ME: Next there will be no "Choose option X and species Y dies." Instead have player choices play out similar to the player impact on Orzammar in DA:O. You affect it's future without destroying it.
Guest_StreetMagic_*
Having player decisions affect the survival of entire species is a bad idea anyway in any series where there is potential for a sequel.
Well, they never planned on this. Hudson said in that "Last Hours" app that there'd be no stories after ME3's timeline.
But of course, there's no money in that... so here we are.
If it does take place outside of the Milkyway Galaxy, that means BioWare can't advertise "TAKE BACK EARTH!" anymore, which would be a really good thing. I'm all for it.
Well, they never planned on this. Hudson said in that "Last Hours" app that there'd be no stories after ME3's timeline.
But of course, there's no money in that... so here we are.
Which is why I think it's totally legit to retcon the endings. They are not the capstone they were originally meant to be.
The thread title feels so over-dramatic
Well, they never planned on this. Hudson said in that "Last Hours" app that there'd be no stories after ME3's timeline.
But of course, there's no money in that... so here we are.
I would've been fine with them ending the series right there
Guest_StreetMagic_*
The thread title feels so over-dramatic
I would've been fine with them ending the series right there
I'd be fine too.
But they should've known better.
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